Five Dark Fates (Three Dark Crowns #4) - Kendare Blake Page 0,99
wall toward the most tenacious of the berry vines. It does not take long to find Braddock; his broad, brown backside is difficult to miss.
“We just came from seeing Luke. He’s being fitted for his armor,” Arsinoe says. “He doesn’t seem to know that it’s real. Hank seemed more concerned than he did. I wanted to grab him by the neck and scream at him.”
“Scream what?”
“That he doesn’t belong in armor. That he doesn’t belong in a fight.”
“Neither do you,” Jules says. “Of all the queens, you’re the least likely to come out of this intact. Katharine has become a warrior, thanks to the borrowed gifts of the dead. And Mirabella was—”
“A thunderstorm. A wildfire.”
“Yes. But you? Despite your affinity for shoving people, you’re no fighter. You fight with your wits. With subterfuge. And magic.”
“Like a poisoner,” Arsinoe says. “I suppose I was always like one, deep down. We’re such a terrible crop of queens, all of us. None of us is what we were supposed to be.”
“No,” says Jules. “We’re all more. And don’t call yourselves a ‘crop.’ You’re not a vegetable.”
Arsinoe chuckles softly. “Don’t say ‘crop’; don’t say ‘whelp. . . .’ You have too many rules, Jules.”
“I never said you couldn’t say ‘whelp.’”
Arsinoe’s smile fades. “That’s right. That was Mirabella.”
They watch as Camden swats playfully at Braddock’s behind. It is a wonder how well they play together. Camden gnaws on Braddock’s leg, and he sends her rolling through the wet moss. She comes up shaking her head, her fur stained dark and sticking up in places, only to go right back to gnawing.
“She needed this,” Jules says, her eyes on her cat. “It’s lifted her spirits.”
“And Braddock’s, too.” But not theirs. They linger in the comfort of each other’s company, but it cannot last.
“Sometimes I just want to run to Grandma Cait and have her take me home.”
“So do I,” says Arsinoe. “And I’m surprised she sends Caragh to the war meetings. I kind of hoped she would advise us.”
“She does advise me. Just not in front of a council.”
“What does she say?”
“That we can’t win. But that we have to try.”
“She’s not so great at raising spirits either, then,” Arsinoe says, and Jules puts a hand on her shoulder.
“My spirit will rise when the battle is over. And I see you alive on the other side.” She pulls Arsinoe into a hug. “Be alive on the other side.”
INDRID DOWN
“The rebel army is marching.”
Genevieve comes to stand behind Katharine’s shoulder as she looks out the window, down at the city. For days, the citizens of Indrid Down have fortified their homes, boarding windows and bringing storage barrels inside.
“Queen Katharine. Did you hear me?”
“I heard you,” Katharine says. She and Genevieve watch as an old horse that is more bones than meat is led quickly down the street, perhaps for safekeeping at some farm in the countryside.
“Should we have the outlying farms searched? Conscript more supplies for the siege before the rebels arrive?”
“It will not be a siege. It will be a battle. And a final one.”
“Should we relocate those we can who are not fighting?”
Katharine nods to the boarded-up windows.
“They know what is coming. They choose to remain. Half of them will probably take up arms against me.”
Genevieve steps up beside her, hands white and trembling on the stone of the window ledge. She is afraid. They are all afraid. For all of the arrogance and strength on the Black Council, none of them has seen a war.
“Kat, do not give up!” She fixes Katharine with her lilac eyes. “My sister did not raise you to stand aside!”
“Your sister raised me to do what I am told. She raised me to serve. To please.” Katharine flexes her hand and feels the dead queens there, just below the surface, taking up more and more space as the days go by. She has certainly served them well. “I loved Natalia. And she loved me, in her way. But she never believed. And now you do not believe either. You think that Arsinoe and Jules Milone march to us with an army of elementals and naturalists and warriors, with oracles to show them our traps and the giftless to rush our cavalry. You think they will overcome us with a flurry of diving hawks and lightning strikes. You have no idea what my army can do.”
“Then you are not afraid?” Genevieve asks. “You do not fear we will lose?”